Here's one person's list of 10 great campgrounds for tent camping in Oregon.

The list was developed during an intense 30 days of research in 2008, but is also backed with 40 years of camping in Oregon.

Note that life offers no guarantees. When I first published this list in 2008, a huge old-growth Sitka spruce tree had decayed and crashed into a picnic table at Oswald West State Park on the Oregon coast just days before my article published.

After assessing the situation, state park management deemed the campground too dangerous to keep open because of the aging forest around it. Regional manager Mike Stein says he regularly checks the campground, but nothing has changed his opinion about reopening it.

There had been talk about replacing the lost sites (which required campers to use wheelbarrows to transport their gear from cars parked along the highway), but nothing has transpired. Hike-in camping is on the master plan for nearby Nehalem Bay State Park, but it would require road construction. Fort Stevens is a more likely possibility, though it's three years out (if then).

In the meantime, Stein suggests campers who like to get away from their cars should go to Saddle Mountain State Natural Area in his region (the north coast), or use the sites that were opened at L.L. Stub Stewart State Park (in Washington County) after the 2008 closure of Oswald West.

A spring of camping around Oregon state produced this list of top 10 campgrounds for tents, published in 2008, with an update to replace Oswald West with Stub Stewart.

With snow lingering in the mountains six years ago, I was unable to visit some other campgrounds worthy of consideration, among them Mallard Marsh in the Deschutes National Forest, Lost Creek at Crater Lake National Park and Anthony Lake in the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest.

This list is presented west to east/north to south (rather than a 1 to 10 listing, due to the difficulty in comparing camps in the different environments, from ocean to mountain and desert.

Cape Perpetua campground

In the 193 million acres managed by the U.S. Forest Service, the oceanfront setting of Cape Perpetua in the Siuslaw National Forest makes it a rarity.

Yes, the Oregon Dunes are south a bit and California's Los Padres National Forest is also oceanfront, but they don't quite match the natural pleasures available by trail from the 37 sites at Cape Perpetua campground -- the view from the cape, the pocket beach at Cape Creek, the awesome tide pools and the fattest Sitka spruce you may ever see.

Lay dibs on site No. 13. The gurgle of the creek guarantees you won't hear a peep from U.S. 101 down the canyon. And since site No. 12 was crunched by a fallen tree, you won't have next-door neighbors.

For RVs: Carl G. Washburne Memorial State Park (midway between Yachats and Florence)

Stub Stewart State Park

This park brought needed camping close to Portland's western suburbs when it opened in a half-dozen years ago. Two of its loops offer full service, with RV connections and shower buildings, plus it also has a yurt village and an equestrian camp.

Tent campers head for the Brooke Creek hike-in camp, open year-round. It has about two-dozen primitive campsites, with water nearby. There are some common areas with fire rings, plus vault toilets.

Stub Stewart is a big biking park, so road bikers and mountain bikers love this part of the campground. The park is four miles north of U.S. 26 (at Manning), on Oregon 47.

Also nearby: Columbia County has several camping parks, including Big Eddy Park seven miles north of Vernonia.

For RVs: Champoeg State Park on the Willamette River in Marion County is another popular close-to-Portland camping park, with some newer pull-through sites large enough for the biggest rigs.

Oxbow Regional Park

Some things about Metro's Oxbow that other campgrounds may want to emulate:

1)The park's entry fee keeps casual tourists from driving around the campground as though it were a sightseeing stop; 2) gates close at dusk, so drunks won't arrive in the middle of the night and set up camp next to you; 3) alcohol and firearms are banned; 4) it's a wildlife sanctuary with no dogs allowed (barking or not).

Located on the Sandy River five miles east of Gresham, Oxbow is much more than a 67-site campground. The park has 500-year-old trees, spawning salmon, free roaming bears and cougars, all within a short drive of Portland. It's the perfect place for city dudes to begin using their new camping gear. Site No. 5 caught my eye.

For RVs: Barton Park, on the Clackamas River near Carver; Clackamas County.

Cascadia State Park

Located on the site of one of western Oregon's early mountain retreats, Cascadia is a little-known state park gem in the Cascade foothills 14 miles east of Sweet Home. The Geisendorfer Hotel, with tennis, croquet and bowling, has long since disappeared, but the feel of the century-old leisure lifestyle of visitors coming to drink the natural mineral waters lingers.

Cascadia is replete with history, from ancient rock art in Cascadia Cave (ranger-led tours required) to ruts of the Old Santiam Wagon Road that predated U.S. 20.

Of its 25 campsites, A12 is particularly spacious and A11 is on Soda Creek, with its .75-mile hiking trail to 150-foot Lower Soda Creek Falls.

Also nearby: Yukwah campground on the South Santiam River; Willamette National Forest.

For RVs: River Bend County Park, six miles east of Sweet Home; Linn County.

Natural Bridge campground

It's a good indication of spaciousness when you pull into 17-site Natural Bridge campground, hear Union Creek in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest, and notice a sign that says, "Campsites 1-8, ½ mile." I was looking for site 16, after a host in a nearby Jackson County park said it was impressive.

I was not only impressed, I was amazed. It was the best single campsite I saw during my odyssey. Why? It is huge. It is historic. It is cheap. And it has a quartermile frontage on the Rogue River.

The site's parking slip looks big enough to handle eight full-size SUVs, with ease. You could squish 100 tented Boy Scouts into the open spaces beneath the 150-foot tall Douglas firs. Several historic lava rock cooking stoves, built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps, are scattered about. All this went for six bucks a night.

You share the river with hikers on the Rogue River Trail, but they can only gaze in envy at anyone lucky enough to snag this site.

Also nearby: Farewell Bend campground, four miles north, is the main camp this part of the Rogue; Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest.

For RVs: Joseph H. Stewart State Recreation Area, Shady Cove.

Head of the River campground

This campground is way out there, as in a 42-mile drive east of Chiloquin deep into the Fremont-Winema National Forest. At least all but the last bit of road is paved.

It's called Head of the River because this is where the Williamson River, a famous blue-ribbon trout stream, gushes full-born out of the ground (similar to the more famous Metolius River in central Oregon). Unlike the Metolius, where the spring is day use only, the Williamson has a five-site campground at river's edge.

Bring binoculars to watch the birds. And be amazed when the wind blows from the west, because a full-size river seemingly flows back into the spring from whence it came.

Also nearby: Jackson Creek campground, just north a ways in the Williamson drainage; Fremont-Winema National Forest.

For RVs: Collier Memorial State Park, Chiloquin.

Green Mountain campground

It's like pitching a tent in the sky when you occupy one of four sites atop Green Mountain in the Lakeview BLM district near Christmas Valley. The views goes on forever.

Actually, the picnic tables and tent sites are located in a small saddle between twin peaks, beneath big juniper trees, to give them some protection from the desert winds. But you can easily take in a view of what must be 10,000 square miles by walking a short way to the active fire lookout on west peak and then to the old gravel quarry atop east peak.

Summer lightning storms out here can be fabulous, as long as they are out in the distance. And when it gets dark, the stars easily outshine the "bright lights" of Fort Rock, 25 miles away.

Also nearby: Hot Springs campground, but in this country "nearby" is 125 miles; Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge.

For RVs: La Pine State Park, La Pine.

Marsters Spring campground

As you camp around Oregon, you notice that Forest Service sites go for $20-plus at the beach, then drop in price to $15, $12, $10 and $6 as you head east. When you reach the Fremont National Forest, the nightly fee is down to zero (at some campgrounds).

Marsters Spring has 10 campsites on the Chewaucan River, eight miles south of Paisley. No. 5 is particularly nice along the clear-running river, whose snowmelt each spring brings life to Abert Lake (if there is enough).

Recently, nearby, the oldest human DNA in the Western Hemisphere was found in Paisley Cave. It seems as though humans have been camping around here for 14,290 year.

Also nearby: Chewaucan Crossing, Jones Crossing and Upper Jones camps are just upstream; Fremont-Winema National Forest.

For RVs: Goose Lake State Recreation Area, 15 miles south of Lakeview.

Minam State Recreation Area

Just inside Wallowa County, en route to the Wallowa Mountains, Minam is worth the short detour to get there. The 12-site campground is two miles north of Oregon 82, along the Wallowa River. Being a bit off the highway sets it apart from four other small, rustic state park campgrounds in this part of the state.

The only noise you hear at Minam, 35 miles northeast of La Grande, besides a great-horned owl hooting at night, is the rumble of a rare Eagle Cap Excursion Train on the tracks across the river. When this happens, it's cause to stop what you're doing and take note of its passing.

For RVs: Wallowa Lake State Recreation Area, six miles south of Joseph.

Succor Creek State Natural Area

Free at last. Succor Creek, 40 miles south of Nyssa, is the only free campground in the Oregon state park system. I suppose they figure, why not? You'll probably burn $150 in gas getting to and from this oasis in the Malheur County desert from Portland, so the camping should be free.

The small 20-site campground straddles Succor Creek, a welcome site in an otherwise parched land. Campsites are nestled in a cottonwood grove tall enough to provide shade, but not so big to block views of the impressive rock cliffs on both sides of the creek.

Also nearby: Slocum Creek at the end of Leslie Gulch; Vale BLM.

For RVs: Lake Owyhee State Park, 33 miles southwest of Nyssa.

From 2008, the description of Oswald West, the park that has been closed to camping since the time my original article was published July 6, 2008:

View full sizeThe tree that a storm in Oswald West State Park took down June 25, 2008, subsequently led to the permanent closure of the park's campground.Rob Kodadek/2008

Oswald West State Park (day use only; no longer in use overnight)

Oregon's dynamic coast is lined with an impressive array of state park campgrounds, from Fort Stevens up by Washington to Harris Beach almost to California. What made this gem near Manzanita stand out for tent campers?

Well, it was one of the few that doesn't make you dizzy contemplating the loops of the mega-campgrounds (Fort Stevens' loops are lettered A through O). At Oz West, you used to be able to park along U.S. 101, grab a wheelbarrow and roll your gear downhill to any of 30 sites among old-growth Sitka spruce.

The park invited lingering, with 13 miles of the Oregon Coast Trail between Cape Falcon and Neahkahnie Mountain, plus Short Sand Beach for surfing. Site 20 was closest to the beach, but lacked a tent platform. Site 12 had a platform, which helped keep things dry in the rain, and had a central location that maked it the campground's "town square."